Tag Archives: Delta Team Ghost

Lookit me finishing a book! It’s been a crazy year, and I’ve not read anywhere near the amount of books that I’ve wanted… although that hasn’t stopped me buying books because that’s just crazy talk. What has been all kinds of great is the discovery of Nicholas Sansbury Smith’s Extinction Cycleseries (big up Geoff Brown for putting me onto them).

I’d been sitting on Extinction End (book five in the series) for a while, which is no reflection on the book itself, rather on my complete lack of time to give it the reader-respect it deserves. Two minutes before bed with eyes feeling like sandpaper does not good reading make. Also makes AJ cranky-cranky-something-something.

So between moving house and all the “fun” that goes along with that, I managed to get away for five days to my father’s farm where there is nothing but the call of birdsong, verdant hills as far as they eye can see, and steer fights over mounds of dirt (don’t ask). The perfect reading environment.

Before I go any further, time for the requisite spoiler warning:

HERE THERE BE SPOILERS. LIKE, BIG MOFO SPOILERS THAT WILL SPOIL IN ALL THEIR SPOILERY SPOILMENT. CLICKETY-CLACK, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

In my Amazon review, I called this series military-horror at its finest, and I have a foot in this world (not the Variant world, ‘cause I don’t think I’d have enough clean underwear to make it through a Variant meet-and-greet), but the military-horror publishing world – I read a lot of it, and I know stand-out when I read it.

Extinction End was supposed to be the final book in the series, and while book six is about to hit the bookshelves any day now, this tale is told with finality and the tying up of threads for the characters trying to survive in this new world. Although part of me has to wonder whether Smith was truly finished with Team Ghost tales, as the epilogue really did leave it open for more.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The Variants have evolved with each book, and are now thinking, strategizing and some are speaking – crude though it is – but it’s a kind of mental… telepathy that has the Variants working as soldiers. Desperate, now, for the only food source available – people. They’re also breeding – evolution really is kicking it up a notch here.

With a great mix of science and military action, Extinction End is hard-core – and it should be. It was written as the last book, so things are always going to get worse before they get better… if only slightly better. There are several threads running through this, but it’s held together by the two main characters: Master Sergeant Reed Beckham and Dr Kate Lovato – now expecting their child.

From beginning to end, there’s no let up on the tension; it’s fast-paced, and tightly packed with action and gunplay. And to add to it all, there’s mutiny afoot. That’s the thing with an apocalyptic event, people (by definition) are going to come at the problem in different ways, and they’re always going to believe their way is the right way, the only way.

Smith plays with these threads like a puppeteer, manipulating and shifting the players on the stage like a macabre dance. Nothing is guaranteed in this world. And going into this book with the knowledge Smith isn’t afraid to maim or kill major characters (you and I need to speak about Riley, Nick), each chapter was like the tightening of a bowstring – there’s only so much give before it snaps and takes you out.

There’s no doubt Smith has a great regard for the women and men who serve in the armed forces; it’s evident in the way he’s drawn those who don the uniform, in their character and their willingness to sacrifice all to save those they’re meant to protect. And some do. Not all make it through this book, nor should they, and with a possible advantage over the Variants, it’s Team Ghost that goes in again.

The last few chapters of this book were a hard read. You know not all of the team will make it back, that the shit will really hit the fan – you’ve been following these characters for five books now, something’s gotta give. And it did, in a big way.

Now if you’ve read this far despite the spoilers, I’m giving you one last chance to look away – major spoiler ahead.

I admire a writer who takes the hard road with a main character, and Smith does that by having Reed hit with Variant venom. It’s a death sentence by all accounts, but the quick thinking of Big Horn via two field amputations saves Beckham’s life. The loss of his right hand and his left leg from the knee down, plus impaired vision means he’ll never be the soldier he once was. His war is effectively over. Tough call it must have been, but it was the right call.

There’s a strange satisfaction in that; Beckham’s not invincible, that war claims everyone in some way or another. From the man in the street who sides with the Variants for survival, to the colonel aboard a battleship who orchestrates a mutiny for launch codes (now that was a satisfying death!). No one is immune, and Smith shows this in both harsh and subtle ways.

There is so much to like about this book – it grabs you from the beginning and doesn’t let you go. That’s what a story should do, it should drag you into the world, kicking and screaming if it must, but it makes you a participant, makes you invested, and makes you both want to turn the next page while dreading it also.

If you haven’t read this series, you need to rectify this immediately. And with book six – Extinction Aftermath – due out today… or tomorrow (time zones are weird), you won’t have to wait to see where Team Ghost ends up next. It’s Europe. Told you there’d be spoilers.

What madness is this! Another review so soon after the last? The world must be spinning off its axis… which is rather fitting considering the theme of Extinction Edge, second book in the Extinction Cycle series. This is definitely a world where humanity is teetering on the brink. Huzzah! I mean… well, I mean ‘huzzah!’ – apocalyptic stories are some of my faves, and when you add in military horror, I’ve hit the trifecta.

Now before we venture into Nicholas Sansbury Smith‘s desolate world of monsters and mayhem, the requisite spoiler warning must be given. *clears throat*

HERE THERE BE SPOILERS. THERE, THERE BE SPOILERS. AND THERE’S ONE. *points* AND THERE’S ANOTHER HIDING BEHIND THAT BURNED-OUT CAR OVER THERE. *points* AND BEWARE THE SPOILERS WAITING IN AMBUSH. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Right then. Let’s begin.

Extinction Edge picks up a wee time after book one, (review of Extinction Horizon here), and things aren’t exactly plum on Plum Island. Sequestered though they are, there’s no denying the siege mentality needed to survive what’s looking a lot like humanity’s last days.

In book two, we get to learn more about Master Sergeant Reed Beckham and his team of Delta Team Ghost, that now consists of just ‘Big Horn’ and Riley – both of whom are excellent secondary characters who I like a lot… which in my world, means: if I like them a lot, death’s a-comin’ (I hate you Jinx Faerie!).

After losing half his team to the contagion virus, Beckham is determined to get Big Horn back to Fort Bragg to rescue the man’s family (dire though the outcome appears). It’s this that drives the first half of the book, and it’s a rough ride. With Riley severely injured, it’s just the Ghost operators on the mission. And a hell of a mission it is. I’m not going to divulge the fate of Horn’s family, but the battle to get to where the survivors may be holed up, is one of the best in the book.

Intertwined with this, is the work of Beckham’s love interest, Dr Kate Lovato, who is trying desperately to find a weapon to combat the monsters born from her previous biological weapon. It’s a mess, but a good mess for a book to have. Kate’s weapon wiped out about 90% of Ebola-ridden monsters, but that remaining 10%? Oh, they’re way nastier, and they’re evolving. Variants, they’re now called, and they’re the stuff of nightmares. (Can I get a huzzah?)

It’s these Variants Beckham and Horn will need to battle if they’re to find survivors at Fort Bragg – where Horn’s family is (hopefully) safe and hidden. It’s clear Smith has extensive knowledge of military tactics and weaponry, and this is brought vividly to life in the battle scenes against the Variants at Fort Bragg. Smith puts to great use high tension and critical action to draw the reader in, and draw it did. It’s been a while since I’ve forgone sleep to read, but Smith owes me at least four hours.

The medical side of Extinction Edge is interspersed nicely with the military action – the peaks and troughs throughout the book give the reader time to breathe, but make no mistake, science is going to play a big role in the books, and Lovato’s character arc is really starting to come into play not just in the lab, but with Beckham. Balance in a totally unbalanced world is a nice juxtaposition.

While it’s clear Beckham and Lovato are the spearheads for the story, the secondary and minor players are well-developed, and don’t sit like cardboard characters on the page. With the amount of death that’s happening (and they’re grisly and kinda awesome), those characters that rise to take the place of those who’ve been lost, hold their own. Fitz is a very addition, and highlights the casualties of a war that’s all too real; Smith gives him purpose, makes him a real player in his own right – he’s fast becoming a… (I see you Jinx Faerie – on your way!).

As the second book in a five-book series, there was always the chance this book could stumble, the author trying to drag out the storyline, but this is a tight read, there’s little wandering from the plot and sub-plots, and the threads are woven together… not so neatly, and they shouldn’t be. This is a story still in its early stages, and there’s much to be discovered. And not all those who’ve survived humanity’s crash are as noble and honour-bound as the soldiers fighting for those who are left.

And with the Variants evolving, hunting in packs and creating ‘food’ stores, the battles are only going to get more bloody. Big shout out to Smith, too, on the creation of the nightmare creatures. They’re an assault on the senses, vile creatures driven by base instincts. And damn difficult to beat.

This is apocalyptic military horror at its best, so much so that I’m already well into book three.

On a Goodreads scale… ooh, it’s tough. Not quite a five, close but just not quite. So… 4.75 stars.